W (letter)
W, w is a letter of the Latin alphabet. It is the twenty-third letter of most variants, being placed after V and before X, as is the case for instance in the English alphabet. Its English name is pronounced [ˈdʌbl̩ juː], double-U, even though in most writing it more closely resembles a double V.
Use in English
| A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Use in English | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Alphabetical word list | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Retroalphabetical list | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Common misspellings |
w is a blowing sound. The lips do not touch and the teeth are not involved. Some foreign learners find it hard to distinguish from v, in which the upper teeth touch the lower lip (compare wét and vét: the accents show stress and pronunciation: see English phonemes). w is 'u' as a consonant: the position of the lips is the same: wíll, whích, whére, whŷ, wíth, wín, vieŵing, deŵy, flôwing, sewing machine = sôwing seed, wént, awây, wêek, wók, want, awãre, ẁash, Wílliam, ẁhat (*(h)wót).
i before e except after c - and usually except after w, too: wèigh, wèight, wêir, wêird, but wìêld (and sêize, Shêila, Nêil and Kêith).
wh can only begin a morpheme, and so most examples occur at the beginning of a word, excepting awhîle. American speakers, and some British (especially Scottish) speakers, pronounce wh as if it were hw - but most BrE speakers do not distinguish it from simple w: whŷ, whére, whén, whích, what, whísper, whím, whíp, whíppet, whéther if (= wéather sky).
In who (*hû), whôle complete (= hôle empty) and whoôping-cough (cf. hoôp), it is the w that is redundant, and wh is pronounced as a mere h.
Like qu, w has an effect on a following a, making it sound like ó in hót (in British English: in American, there is the usual à sound): ẁas, ẁhat, ẁant, ẁash, ẁander or like ŏ in ŏught, especially before r, l and ll: wårm, wåll, wåltz, Wårner - and in wåter; however, in the onomatopoeic words whám, wháck, wág and in wágon, the á is as usual.
w can also affect a following o, making it sound like ú (cúp) in BrE: wòrry, wònder, wòn, and ü (bürn) in AmE wörry, wönder, wön. It also makes a following or sound like ër: wörd, wörk; thus wó- is rare and informal: wónky.
w is redundant initially before r: wrîte, wríng neck (= ríng noise, round), wróng, wríst, wréstle (*réssəl) and in awrŷ (*ərŷ: a as schwa, not the åw sound).
Final w is silent, unless the next word begins with a vowel: compare flôw, silent w, with flôw ón where the w is heard as in flôwing. Similarly in knôwing, but in knówledge, although the spelling is retained, the ôw has become ó, making it sound like *nóllidge.
w is also silent in swŏrd (*sŏrd), ānswer (*ānser) and in tŵo 2 (= toô also, much) where, though historically inaccurate (cf. twîce, twâin) one can put an accent on it and treat it as part of the vowel.
eŵ is normally pronounced 'yû', like the whole words eŵe sheep and yoû me, but not before liquids [r] and [l]: Ándreŵ (*Androô, not -ryû), Leŵis (*Loôwis, not Lyoô-). The w retains its consonant sound before a vowel: vieŵer, neŵest, feŵer, jeŵel, eŵer, but ew can of course be two separate sounds in two separate syllables, with the w as consonant: rewård, bewãre.
åw occurs in jåw, jáckdåw, påw, dråw. Because this is the same sound as the ŏ in ŏr, fŏr, cŏre and bŏring, such words as påwing and dråwing are often heard with an r pronounced in place of the w, in the first case *drŏring, and in the other sounding like pŏring looking and pŏuring out: this non-spelling pronunciation is widely regarded as uneducated.
Invisible w occurs after u in Jóshua (*Jóshûwə), and before -ing in words like gôing (which rhymes with flôwing), doing and cûeing (which rhyme with vieŵing and heŵing).
In English, Polish w sounds like [f] at the end of a syllable: Krácow (-óff), Szymanówski (*Shimmanóffsky), Zbígniew (-nyéff). But it retains its [w] sound before a vowel (although here it is pronounced like [v] in the original Polish): Wózniak, Kowálski. And, from Dutch, silent final in Concërtgebòuw.
As w is silent before a consonant, it cannot begin clusters, and it can only be doubled accidentally, and very unusually, as in the surname Låwwell.